(August 16, 2013 at 4:16 am)Stimbo Wrote:(August 16, 2013 at 3:56 am)pocaracas Wrote: PS. language detail: the 'ç' is read like a 's'. we use the cedilla to turn a 'c' before an 'a' or 'o' (which should generally be read as 'k') into the 's' sound.
I always thought that was pronounced as a soft 'th' sound, as in 'thing'. That's how it works in Spanish, I believe. Is it different in Portuguese? It's the rationale behind the misconception, seldom heard these days, that everyone from that part of the world speaks with a lisp.
Portuguese is different from spanish.
We don't have the 'th' sound, that spanish are so famous for... I remember a BBC comic show where they had a sketch from some southern country where all the words of that language sounded like "ethethethe ethe ethe " and then... "scorchio" (this meant "hot").
Just listen to one and the other speaking and you'll get just how different.
I think of spanish as sounding a bit like arabic, always habla, habla, habla.
The sound of portuguese has been compared to russian, with all the RR and different r's... we're worse than the french in that aspect!
But ç is only meant as a modifier of c before 'a' and 'o' and 'u'. The 'c' is before an 'e' or 'i' is always read with an 's' sound, as in "incest", "recipient". But a normal 'c' before an 'a', 'o' or 'u' has a 'k' sound, like "car", "common" or "cut". This rule seems to extend into english...
We then have the cedilla modifier that retains the original latin word with a 'c', but adapts it to the new sound 's', like in "caçar" (to hunt), "maçã" (apple), "coçar" (to scratch), "Açores" (Azores), etc...
Why not just put an 's' in place of the 'c'? probably to keep the original 'c' and also because, a lot of these words show a vowel before the 'c', as well. There's another rule in portuguese, where by if an 's' is between two vowels, then it's pronounced as a smooth 's', almost sounding like a 'z', like in "laser". The rule stands like that always! If you want to stress the 's', you make it double, like "massa" (pasta).
Most (if not all) portuguese words have a one to one relation between how they sound and how they're written. Even if you've never heard a particular word, you can read it properly.
Oh, yeah... there's an exception I just thought of...
"Besta"
- can mean "beast", in which case the 'e' is a calm one, like the 'e' in "one"
- can mean "crossbow", the weapon. In this case, the 'e' is open like in "jet".
And then you have the major sound in portuguese, the one everyone complains about (even I!, it's the main reason I'm not a great fan of portuguese songs) in that word "besta", the 's' doesn't sound like an 's' at all, it sound more like a 'j', but not quite.... (a bit like the 'j' in Taj Mahal) And we have many many many words with such 's's in them... for a small taste, all plurals (words ending in 's') are like that.
There it is... a small taste of the complexities of the pt-pt language.
I should have made this a new thread!
